Siren Gold Limited (ASX: SNG) has intercepted six metres of quartz reef grading 5.1 g/t Au with visible gold at its Big River target on New Zealand’s South Island.
The company is currently drilling at Alexander River and Big River, completing 36 holes for 3,120m by the end of January.
Recent results include the 6m @ 5.1 g/t Au from 142.2m at Big River and 8m @ 2.9g/t and 3m @ 4.1g/t Au from 26m and 43m, respectively, at Alexander River.
In more good news for Siren, the Department of Conservation (DoC) has approved an additional 34 drill pads at Alexander River. This will allow the 1.2km strike length of the Alexander River reef to be drilled on nominal 50m centres down to 500m vertically if required.
The Alexander River project (comprised of Exploration Permit 60446) is located ~26 km southeast of Reefton. The project overlays the areas of the historic Alexander River Mine until it closed in 1943, which produced 41,089 oz of gold at an average gold recovery grade of ~26g/t.
Mapping and rock chip sampling was undertaken last year at Alexander River where two quartz reefs were discovered approximately 1km to the north of Loftus McKay reef in Mullocky Creek.
The new discovery reef is a 10-12m thick (true thickness) shear zone comprising of quartz veins, stockwork, quartz breccia, pug breccia and mineralised argillite. It contains some pyrite and lessor arsenopyrite. Eighteen 1.0m channel samples were collected but fire assay results did not detect any gold. Multi-element data is still awaited.
Soil sampling between Mullocky Creek and Alexander River was undertaken in January with 478 samples collected (Figure 1) to extend the CRA soil grid to the NE to cover potential extensions of the Alexander River reef system, including the Newcombe and New Discovery reefs.
The drilling at Alexander River to date has been testing the near surface (25-75m) mineralisation aimed at confirming the trench results and the thickness and orientation of the mineralised zone along the 1.2km strike length.
Drilling to date by Siren over ~500m of the strike length has generally intersected relatively thick mineralisation confirming trench results with high grade mineralisation intersected adjacent to the historically mined McVicar Shoot; 8.5m @ 11g/t Au and 6.9m @ 7.3g/t Au in and lower grade mineralisation between the shoots; 4.7m @ 2.9g/t Au, 8m @ 2.6g/t Au and 8m @ 2.9g/t.
Mapping has confirmed that a large broad anticline mapped in the St George area 3km south of Big River is connected to the Big River anticline. This anticline is largely obscured by thin glacial till but with sufficient basement outcrop in creek beds to map this structure. This structure is a prime target area for Big River Mine style mineralisation.